TAG-Org effectively participates in the Internet Governance Forum:

Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt ? 1 December 2009 - Hundreds of representatives of governments, international organizations, the Internet community, the private sector, civil society, and the media have gathered from 15 to 18 November 2009 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, for the fourth meeting of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF).

Being an active member of the Multistakeholder Advisory Group of the IGF for several years, Talal Abu-Ghazaleh Organization (TAG-Org) participated by a high ranging delegation and effectively contributed to the IGF events. In addition the Founder and Chairman of TAG-Org Mr. Talal Abu-Ghazaleh participated in the AGF in his capacity as the Chairman of the UN Global Alliance for ICT and Development.

Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh chaired an important session of the IGF and delivered a speech as GAID Chairman in which he stressed that he has been enthusiastically supportive of promoted the establishment of the Internet Governance Forum when he was the Vice-Chair of the UN ICT TF and Chair of the U.N. Internet forum in Berlin; and that he presently continues to promote IGF as the UN GAID chair, and will always do as TAG Organization chair.

He explained that TAG-Org has proudly served on the United Nations working groups and U.N. Secretary-General working groups on Internet governance since its establishment. He said: ?Today, once again, I wish to applaud IGFs success under its able leadership,? and added that ? IGF and GAID are twin brothers born out of the WSIS process and in the spirit of support for IGF under the debate about its future
agenda, I wish to suggest that IGF and GAID have a lot to gain by combining their agendas through the development of a creative formula."

On the other hand, Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh indicated that he UN GAID had adopted a practical approach to the achievement of the UN Millennium Development Goals and other development goals and would be submitting in the year 2010 a program with clear indicators of how ICT can be used for development in every sector of development, including business, health, education, disability, and others.

Discussions during the Sharm el-Sheikh meeting focused on issues related to the main theme for this years meeting, "Internet Governance ? Creating opportunities for all", including the management of key Internet resources such as the domain name system, Internet protocol addresses, the root server system, technical standards, interconnection and telecommunications; the safety of the Internet and the fight against cybercrime; and improving access by all and promoting local content and cultural diversity; in addition to the opportunities made available to states, people and businesses, and how to address risks and challenges involved while raising awareness on the development dimension of the Internet governance. The IGF events also included panel discussions, workshops, and other gatherings on several related issues.


IGF
The Internet Governance Forum is an outcome of the "Tunis phase" of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), which took place in 2005 as a new forum for policy dialogue to discuss issues related to key elements of Internet governance in order to foster the Internets sustainability, robustness, security, stability and development.
The three previous meetings of the Forum were held in Athens, Greece, in November 2006, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in November 2007, and in Hyderabad, India, in November 2008.